{"id":1638,"date":"2021-02-16T11:32:22","date_gmt":"2021-02-16T11:32:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/horizon.peachpuff-wolverine-566518.hostingersite.com\/?p=1638"},"modified":"2021-02-16T11:32:22","modified_gmt":"2021-02-16T11:32:22","slug":"how-does-it-feel-to-be-a-bee-the-quest-to-understand-animal-sentience","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/scienceblog.com\/horizon\/1638\/how-does-it-feel-to-be-a-bee-the-quest-to-understand-animal-sentience\/","title":{"rendered":"How does it feel to be a bee? The quest to understand animal sentience"},"content":{"rendered":"
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What is it like to be a bee? Or a spider? Does a crab feel pleasure or pain? Behavioural and welfare science have moved on considerably in the past 20 years, but there is still a huge amount we don\u2019t know about how animals actually feel \u2013 or, indeed, whether they all do.<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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\u2018I think it\u2019s one of the great challenges facing science and philosophy in the 21st century,\u2019 said Dr Jonathan Birch, a philosopher of science at the London School of Economics and Political Science, UK. \u2018It\u2019s not purely something we can think of as science as usual \u2026 we need new ways of thinking about sentience.\u2019<\/p>\n

While it is now generally accepted that many other mammals have some kind of sentience \u2013 or subjective experience of the world and their own bodies \u2013 there are still huge gaps in our knowledge. Things get more blurred the further we move away from humans, where animals can have very different brain and neural systems.<\/p>\n

\u2018Evidence from other primates has been very influential on the science of human consciousness, but there has been a tendency to dismiss non-mammals,\u2019 said Dr Birch. \u2018It\u2019s precisely the non-mammals that have been a source of a lot of recent discussion.\u2019<\/p>\n

In 2010, cephalopod molluscs \u2013 a group of animals including octopuses, squid and cuttlefish \u2013 were included alongside vertebrates in the\u00a0EU\u2019s directive on protection of animals used for scientific purposes<\/a>. That has led to further debate about the nature of sentience in animals including crustaceans, fish and insects. It\u2019s a question that could be crucial to conservation and organisms\u2019 ethical status in animal welfare legislation, as sentience and pain can be key criteria for the type of protection given.<\/p>\n

\u2018As you get further away evolutionarily from humans, the brain organisation gets more and more different,\u2019 said Dr Birch. \u2018When you\u2019re looking at something like an octopus, it\u2019s completely different, so that source of evidence is no longer there.\u2019<\/p>\n

While some researchers support the idea that creatures such as insects have consciousness, others perceive them as\u00a0\u2018natural zombies\u2019<\/a>\u00a0that, much like robots, can be cognitively sophisticated but have no conscious experiences. There is also limited knowledge and controversy about animals\u2019 feelings of pain, with Dr Birch explaining that some reactions to seemingly painful events may be unconscious reflexes.<\/p>\n

\u2018What makes it difficult is that you have so many theories of what conscious experience is and nothing even close to agreement,\u2019 he said. \u2018You have some theories that imply every living thing would have these experiences to some degree, and other theories that seem to imply only humans could have them.\u2019<\/p>\n

New thinking<\/strong><\/p>\n

Though Dr Birch acknowledges that there will always be a barrier to truly getting inside animals\u2019 heads, he says we can find out a lot more. He believes a new way of thinking is needed that crosses the divide between philosophy and science, wrapping in evolutionary biology, psychology, neuroscience, physiology and animal welfare science.<\/p>\n

In this vein, the\u00a0ASENT<\/a>\u00a0project he leads is aiming to develop a conceptual framework for understanding animal sentience, with a bid to bring such studies into the mainstream as a rigorous scientific discipline.<\/p>\n

As well as researching and applying scientific and philosophical literature and theories over the next four years, ASENT plans to test sentience in bees. Dr Birch said they make ideal study subjects in this area because they\u2019re sophisticated invertebrates with complex social networks, while also being much easier to examine experimentally than animals such as cephalopods.<\/p>\n

\u2018Bees are a great place to start if you\u2019re looking for evidence of conscious experience in these controversial cases,\u2019 he said. \u2018They are cognitively sophisticated and very good learners, so it makes sense to ask: \u201cCan they do these forms of learning that in us seem to be linked to consciousness?\u201d\u2019<\/p>\n

The exact nature of the tests has yet to be decided amid Covid-related delays, but some will involve examining bees\u2019 responses to flashing LED lights, with the aim of matching visual stimuli to types of sensory reactions previously linked to human consciousness.<\/p>\n

One such form of associative learning is\u00a0trace conditioning<\/a>, in which two stimuli are separated by a temporal gap \u2013 such as a noise followed a second later by a puff of air towards the eye. Dr Birch explains that humans only seem able to learn this association, shown by blinking at the right point, when they are consciously aware of the stimuli and time gap. If given a distracting task at the same time, they cannot do this.<\/p>\n

\u2018Learning about time in that way seems to be really difficult,\u2019 said Dr Birch. \u2018It\u2019s a sophisticated form of learning that in us seems to be facilitated by conscious awareness.\u2019<\/p>\n

Other tests that may suggest consciousness are rapid reversal learning \u2013 involving the ability to learn a relationship between two stimuli and then the opposite when it is reversed \u2013 and cross-modal learning, involving associations that cut across senses such as sounds and smells.<\/p>\n

A battery of such tests on bees will be used to seek evidence of the extent to which a whole range of abilities is linked to conscious experience. This may then pave the way for looking into whether these patterns of learning are replicated in other animals, and whether developing one ability makes them more likely to develop the others.<\/p>\n

Dr Birch hopes the project will help build towards a\u00a0rigorous methodological framework<\/a>\u00a0for assessing the consciousness profiles of individual species rather than ranking animals on a single sliding scale.<\/p>\n

\u2018We\u2019re trying to think about feeling as broadly as we can, and recognising that the feelings of animals might not really fit into the categories that we use to describe our own feelings,\u2019 he said.<\/p>\n

\u2018Knowing that an animal is sentient only tells you that she\u2019s owed some moral consideration. Knowing the interests that an animal has tells you much more about what kind of treatment she is owed.\u2019<\/p>\n

-Dr Susana Mons\u00f3, University of Veterinary Medicine in Vienna, Austria<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Animal welfare<\/strong><\/p>\n

Part of the ASENT project is also about working with animal welfare charities such as the UK\u2019s Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (RSPCA).<\/p>\n

Dr Penny Hawkins, head of the RSPCA\u2019s Animals in Science Department, welcomes the greater emerging focus on sentience, saying a robust framework for consciousness would give a much better foundation for protecting animal welfare.<\/p>\n

\u2018It used to be regarded as a sort of dichotomy, where either you\u2019ve got full-on human consciousness and sentience or you\u2019re some kind of brainless automaton \u2013 like a light being on or off. Now it\u2019s much more of a dimmer-switch kind of approach, with a sliding scale.\u2019<\/p>\n

She says there is a long way to go and that being deemed sentient is not a \u2018golden ticket\u2019 to better treatment because it can still take a back seat to political and economic considerations, while creating legislation will be complex. Nevertheless, she believes this makes it even more important to gather solid evidence on the subject.<\/p>\n

And Dr Hawkins would like to see animal impact assessments that bring in the subjective experience of animals when addressing conservation issues, on top of current environmental impact assessments.<\/p>\n

Professor Donald Broom, an emeritus researcher in veterinary medicine and animal welfare at the University of Cambridge, UK, who is not involved in the ASENT project, stresses we should not forget that we as humans are also animals, so having a wider focus on the whole animal kingdom is a pathway to learning more about ourselves too.<\/p>\n

On top of that, says Prof. Broom, we have stages in our own lives when we are less sentient \u2013 such as before birth and in cases of dementia. However, that doesn\u2019t stop our needs being considered at these times, as he says they should be for other species.<\/p>\n

He adds that more needs to be known about brains different to ours. \u2018There are these prejudices that you have to be rather similar to humans \u2013 and have a brain which is like a human brain \u2013 to have any cognitive ability,\u2019 said Prof. Broom.<\/p>\n

For example, he says, having a small brain does not necessarily imply reduced cognitive ability, as backed up by the\u00a0sophisticated abilities of jumping spiders, ants, houseflies, small squid, cleaner wrasse and hummingbirds<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u2018Hummingbirds obviously have a small brain, but if you watch a hummingbird you can see that it comes and looks at you, evaluates you quite quickly and decides you\u2019re too slow-moving to be of any consequence at all, and gets on with life.\u2019<\/p>\n

Amassing evidence<\/strong><\/p>\n

Prof. Broom points to the importance of amassing more evidence of sentience in animals such as bees, given the\u00a0grave threats they currently face and debates over the use of pesticides like neonicotinoids<\/a>. He points out that it\u2019s also now easier to do brain monitoring in moving animals.<\/p>\n

\u2018It\u2019s not just important to know whether animals are sentient, but also more specifically what kinds of interests they have,\u2019 added Dr Susana Mons\u00f3, a philosopher who works on animal minds and ethics at the University of Veterinary Medicine in Vienna, Austria.<\/p>\n

\u2018Knowing that an animal is sentient only tells you that she\u2019s owed some moral consideration. Knowing the interests that an animal has tells you much more about what kind of treatment she is owed.\u2019<\/p>\n

This is particularly crucial, she says, in animals affected by human practices, such as farm animals, while knowing this in insects may grow in importance if they become more widely viewed as a solution to global food crises.<\/p>\n

\u2018Given the huge numbers that would be involved in farming them at a large enough scale to substitute other sources of meat, there are potentially gigantic welfare costs that ought to be taken into account,\u2019 said Dr Mons\u00f3.<\/p>\n

The research in this article was funded by the EU’s European Research Council. If you liked this article, please consider sharing it on social media.<\/em><\/p>\n

Originally published on Horizon magazine.<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

What is it like to be a bee? Or a spider? Does a crab feel pleasure or pain? Behavioural and welfare science have moved on considerably in the past 20 years, but there is still a huge amount we don\u2019t know about how animals actually feel \u2013 or, indeed, whether they all do. \u2018I think … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":298,"featured_media":1639,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"generate_page_header":"","_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[11],"tags":[138,150,327],"class_list":["post-1638","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-earth-energy-environment","tag-animals","tag-bees","tag-consciousness"],"yoast_head":"\nHow does it feel to be a bee? 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